I know firsthand what it’s like for a young woman to lose her father. It’s something no one should have to go through twice. Yet, here I am, experiencing it second-hand as an observer of my own two grown daughters. Almost three years after my ex-husband’s sudden death they are still suffering from his financial irresponsibility. They are learning of his faults, his mistakes and his unhappiness. How does a daughter hold a happy memory in her heart’s mind of the man that means the most to her when she is faced with more truth than she should have to handle in her time of grief?
I stand by, fortunate that my own father was a responsible man, lucky to have disengaged from the irresponsible one several years earlier. I stand back and watch one daughter overcompensate with her own hyper-responsible nature and the other, embracing denial, do nothing. I stand back and pray that the scar tissue on my heart is strong enough to hold it all together for all of us one more time.
Maraya